I was interviewed by MSNBC’s Michele Richinick about the conservative outcry over Texas’ plans to execute Scott Panetti, the mentally ill death row inmate. She quoted me as saying,

“There is an unprecedented conservative response to this case,” Marc Hyden, advocacy coordinator for Conservatives Concerned about the Death Penalty, told msnbc. “This is another example of an utterly broken system. This person shouldn’t have been allowed to represent himself.”

“It is clear,” the conservatives continued, “that he has been suffering from severe mental illness since long before he committed the offense that landed him on death row.” But prosecutors argue that Panetti fakes his illness.